


The Best and The Worst

by solrosan



Series: The Daniel Green Series [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, Parentlock, Posting of old Fic, Prompt Fill, Teenage Parents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-19
Updated: 2013-09-19
Packaged: 2017-12-27 01:11:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/972573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solrosan/pseuds/solrosan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When talking about violin playing at odd hours and going days without speaking Sherlock just happen to forget mentioning he has custody of his fifteen year old son every second weekend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Best and The Worst

**Author's Note:**

> This is an old prompt fill asking for Sherlock as the father of a teenager that I've polished up a bit (mostly language) after debating for a long time if I'd dare put this up on AO3. But, as I said in my LJ note a long time ago: I like this verse so so much, that hadn't the basic idea been so silly it'd gone straight through to my headcanon.
> 
> I hope you enjoy it too.
> 
> * * *

“What are your plans for the weekend?” Sherlock asked without looking up from his piles of newspaper clippings. John couldn’t tell if Sherlock was sorting them or just shuffling around, but he had stopped trying to figure it out a long time ago.

“I’ll probably pretend there’s a difference between weekdays and weekends when you’re unemployed,” John said. “Why? Lestrade’s not letting you in to the Yard and you need me to get something?”

“No,” Sherlock said, frowning at one of the clippings. “I can be in and out of there faster than you, with or without permission to enter, anyway.” 

“So what, then?”

Sherlock kept staring at the news clipping, ignoring John’s question until he repeated it. “Mm, yes, I was going to ask if you’d be willing to give your bed to Daniel this weekend.”

“To who?”

Sherlock looked up with his _How can you not know what I’m talking about_ -look, but after remembering that he shared a flat with one of the planets close to seven billion idiots he shook his head and went back to the clippings.

“Daniel,” Sherlock said. “My son.”

John blinked. “Excuse me, your what?” 

“My son,” Sherlock repeated so clearly John couldn’t mishear him.

“You have a, a… You have a son?” John stared at him. 

“Yes, a fifteen year old son,” said Sherlock. He started to put the clippings back in the boxes he had removed them from in the first place as he continued to explain. “He lives with his mother in Ipswich most of the time. I have him every other weekend. I had him every weekend for a while, when he was younger, but it didn’t go so well. Work, and it’s a pretty long trip from Ipswich to London and, well, it didn’t work out. His mother and I don’t really get along anymore.”

John gaped. Not only was Sherlock a father, but he was the father of a teenager! If Sherlock hadn’t sounded so guilty about the arrangement he now had with his son John would have probably begun his interrogation there. Instead he started with: 

“Why can’t he have your bed?”

“He made it perfectly clear some years ago that he didn’t want my bed,” Sherlock said, waving it all off with his hand. “Never mind. Don’t worry about it. He can sleep on the sofa, that’s what he usually does. I’ve never had a place big enough for two beds.”

“Why don’t—” 

“I realise you have questions,” Sherlock kept going without stopping for air. “And that I should probably have mentioned this earlier, but I didn’t—“

“Sherlock.”

Sherlock stopped, looking up at John who smiled.

“I have questions, _so_ many questions,” John started, smiling even wider. “But let’s start with buying your son a bed. Your room’s big enough to fit at least a folding bed.”

“Why didn’t I think of that?” Sherlock looked stumped, and sounded very annoyed with himself.

“Come on.” John got to his feet. “Let’s start with the bed, and then you can explain this to me over sushi.”

“Sushi?” Sherlock said disapprovingly, but got up. 

John chuckled and tossed Sherlock’s coat to him. “We can take Italian, if you like, but at some point you’ll have to at least show me a picture or I’m not sure I’ll believe you.”

Sherlock rolled his eyes, but already in the cab he pulled out his mobile and showed John picture after picture of a blond haired, blue eyed teenager. John, amazed by the striking resemblance between the boy and Sherlock, wondered if the mother – Joyce, Sherlock told him – had contributed with anything other than the colour template.

Later, over Italian at Angelo’s, John learned that Daniel was the result of a broken condom and two scared teenagers who had tiptoed around the truth until it had been too late to have an abortion. Sherlock and Joyce had been together for three months when Joyce got pregnant and they had stayed together until Daniel had been eighteen weeks old. Sherlock sounded quite convinced that it would have ended sooner if they hadn’t been expecting a baby.

The days leading up to the weekend were filled with equal amounts of anticipation and fear, at least for John. What Sherlock thought was just as hard to tell as ever. Without even thinking about it John childproofed the flat. It was probably silly since the boy obviously had survived fifteen years in similar environments. 

To John’s surprise Sherlock came home with two grocery bags of proper food on Thursday. Not to mention that all the remaining traces from the foot-in-the-sink incident magically disappeared on Friday morning, and the lock finally went on the chemical cabinet in the afternoon. John was sincerely impressed with Sherlock and so, so curious to meet Daniel.

Just before seven on Friday Sherlock’s phone rang and Sherlock jumped of the sofa to answer. John had never seen him answer the phone that quickly.

“Sherlock Holmes,” Sherlock said as he walked to the window. “Yes, you turn right at the— Yes, it’s Baker Street. Yes, right again when you reach it. No, you don’t need a cab. No. It’s not even 200 meters, Daniel. No. Yes, 221B. See you soon.”

He hung up and shook his head, looking vaguely annoyed, and more nervous than John had ever seen him.

“He wanted to take a cab from the station,” Sherlock muttered. “It doesn’t even take five minutes to walk here. And after the serial suicides I don’t think I’ll let him anywhere _near_ a cab again.”

John was surprised, or shocked, or perhaps just taken by his first look at Sherlock as a father. It had just sounded so… not like the Sherlock he had got to know so far. Sherlock was already halfway down the stairs to meet Daniel when John shook the astonishment enough to follow.

“Mrs Hudson, he’s almost here now!” Sherlock called out just moments before he opened the door. Both John and Mrs Hudson were quick to follow him outside.

“There he is,” Sherlock said, pointing at a gangly young man, and then he raised his hand to wave. The smile on Sherlock’s face was happy, almost insecure.

The boy didn’t just look like a blond version of Sherlock, he _moved_ like Sherlock as well. It was seriously disturbing to see a young, blond Sherlock, wearing jeans and a hoodie, walk across the street and John had to look away to not stare.

“Hi,” Daniel said as he reached them and he and Sherlock shared an awkward hug. John recognised it as the same type of hug he’d used to share with his father at that age. Actually, he still shared that sort of hug with his father.

“Daniel, you remember Mrs Hudson, don’t you?” Sherlock introduced the landlady as he moved the teenager towards the house.

“Ehm… Hi, Mrs Hudson,” Daniel said, but to his credit he reached out to shake Mrs Hudson’s hand.

“Sherlock, don’t embarrass the boy, surely he can’t remember me. But my goodness, you’ve grown. I haven’t seen you since you were this big,” Mrs Hudson twittered, showing a height somewhere between a toddler’s and Daniel’s – he was almost as tall as Sherlock by now.

“And this,” Sherlock continued, ignoring Mrs Hudson and turning his son to John, “is Dr John Watson.”

“Hi, Daniel,” said John with a big smile and reached out his hand. 

“Dr Watson,” Daniel greeted and took the hand as he scrutinised John.

“John’s fine,” John said as they moved inside, Mrs Hudson to her place and the rest of them upstairs.

“So this is it. What do you think?” Sherlock asked as Daniel dropped his backpack next to the sofa.

“Better than the one in Heston,” Daniel said, flinging himself on the sofa just like his father often did, as if he had lived there forever.

“Feet off sofa, or shoes off feet,” Sherlock said, pointing at Daniel’s feet. Before John had the time to say anything Sherlock gave him a look asking him to not mention that this rule had never been enforced at 221B Baker Street before. 

Daniel obeyed, but rolled his eyes. “It’s my bed, isn’t it?”

“No, actually it is not,” Sherlock said, looking pleased. “We got you a bed.”

“’We’?” Daniel sat up, pointing at John but looking at Sherlock. “Dad, don’t tell me you’re gay with this army bloke.”

John blinked. Hearing Daniel call Sherlock “dad” as if it was the most natural thing in the world (which it probably was to him) blew his mind. 

“Don’t be absurd,” Sherlock told his son, picking up the backpack and placing it on a chair instead. “Your very existence proves that I’m not a six on the Kinsey scale.”

“You’re not a zero, either,” said Daniel. Then he nodded in John’s direction. “Is he?”

Sherlock flinched. “Daniel!”

“What?”

John looked between father and son as they glared at each other, not quite sure what this discussion was about.

“So, Daniel,” John said, getting them both to look surprised at him. “Have you had dinner with your mum or do you want something to eat? There’s a great Chinese place you passed on your way from the station.”

“It’s all right, I’m not really staying,” said Daniel, getting up from the sofa. “I’m going out.”

“No, you’re not,” Sherlock said, blocking the way out of the sitting room by standing in the doorway.

“Yes, I am.” Daniel crossed his arms over his chest and looked up in Sherlock’s face with a lippy expression. “I’m meeting friends.”

“What friends?”

“You don’t know them.”

“What friends?” Sherlock repeated without any sign of room for compromises. 

Daniel snorted. “Friends from school.”

“Really? Friends from Northgate are here, in London, on a Friday night?” Sherlock didn’t sound convinced. At all. John wondered why Daniel even bothered trying with white lies and bad excuses. Even John had seen through this story, but still, forget hiding cigarettes, stealing alcohol, or making up alibis when you talked to Sherlock.

Daniel, however, seemed to stick to his story.

“Yes,” he said, not breaking eye contact. “Funny coincidence, isn’t it?” 

“Hilarious,” said Sherlock dryly. “You’re staying here.”

“Oh piss off!” Daniel spitted out. “Angela and Simon are having a party tomorrow at Simon’s, but I can’t go because I’m stuck in the world’s most boring place with _you_ and you don’t even let me go out! Why can’t you let me at least have fun when you force me here?”

“Because,” Sherlock said, slowly. “I know exactly what kind of fun fifteen year old boys have in London on Friday nights.”

“Hypocrite.”

“Well, yes, I do feel a bit too young to become a grandfather just yet,” Sherlock said, his mouth twisting. “More importantly though, is that it’s dark soon and London’s dangerous even if you know where to go. Not to mention that your mother would kill me if something happens to you.”

Daniel rolled his eyes. “Like anything’s going to happen.”

John could see how a long string of answers danced passed Sherlock, probably every single murder case he had ever worked on. There was true worry behind that determined mask he wore. 

“I’m going to show you the bedroom now,” Sherlock said calmly, stating that this conversation was over. “Your mother said you had some homework to do, so you might as well get an early start on that.”

“You can’t tell me what to do!” Daniel stamped the floor.

“Take your backpack,” Sherlock said as if he hadn’t heard him and, to John’s surprise, Daniel obeyed. They disappeared to Sherlock’s bedroom and the door was slammed shut.

A while later Sherlock came back out, alone. John muted the sound on the telly where he had started watching the news.

“So that’s Daniel,” Sherlock said, sighing and falling onto the sofa in very much the same way Daniel had done just minutes before.

“Charming,” said John, smiling. “I wonder who he takes after.”

“Shut up,” Sherlock said with a similar smile. 

“You’ve chained him to his books?”

“Duct taped, it hurts more when you pull it off,” Sherlock said, sitting up properly. “I agreed to let him go out when he’s done.”

John nodded, turning the sound back on and turning back to the telly where a rerun of _Midsomer Murders_ had just started. Just before the end credits Daniel came out from the bedroom, looking far less cocky now.

“Are you done?” Sherlock asked, having John mute the sound again.

“Yes.”

“Do you want me to look at it?” Sherlock held out a hand, expecting to be handed something.

“No.” Daniel shook his head. Sherlock gave him a questioning look, so Daniel sighed frustrated. “You can’t look it over, it’s history.”

“Fair enough,” said Sherlock. “Be home by midnight.”

“Yeah, yeah.” 

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed. “I mean it. Midnight. Baker Street. Be here.” 

“Yes, dad.” Daniel almost rolled his eyes. “Bye, John. Don’t wait up.”

“Whatever you do: _don’t take a cab!_ ” Sherlock yelled after Daniel as he disappeared down the stairs. The door slammed shut and Sherlock sank deep down in the sofa.

“He’s going to be late,” he muttered, turning to John. “Would it be bad to have Mycroft spying on him?”

“I have a feeling Daniel would approve of having Mycroft looking over his shoulder just as you do,” John said, smirking.

“Stop trying to be clever,” Sherlock huffed, but then he smile slightly as if he wasn’t able not to. John found it strange to see Sherlock smile this often, but it suited him.

Sherlock’s prediction turned out to be correct: Daniel did not come home at midnight. Sherlock had placed himself in front of the window ten minutes to midnight, just watching the street outside, but it wasn’t until seventeen minutes past that he actually did something.

“Do you think anything has happened?” he asked, genuine worry in his voice.

“I’m sure he’s just late, Sherlock,” John said. “Have you tried calling him?”

“I’ve texted.”

“Call him. I’m sure he’s close.”

Sherlock went to fetch his phone, worry oozing from him. It was a bit contagious, even though John was sure nothing had happened to Daniel. Still, watching Sherlock look for his phone made him feel guilty for every time he had missed curfews as a teenager.

Before Sherlock had dialled his son’s number the door downstairs opened. Sherlock basically flew down the first flight of stairs to make sure it actually was Daniel who came home.

“Where have you been? Why didn’t you answer the text?” John could hear Sherlock ask in a stern, but hushed, voice to not wake Mrs Hudson. What Daniel answered was impossible to make out. 

“You reek of cigarettes.” Sherlock’s hushed voice continued to scold the boy as they both made their way up the stairs.

“Piss off,” Daniel told him, not bothering keeping his voice down, as they reached the sitting room.

“Have you been smoking something other than nicotine?” Sherlock asked, trying to get Daniel to look at him so that he could examine his eyes.

“None of your business,” Daniel said as Sherlock forced the lamp in his son’s face for a close eye examination. 

“Get off me!” Daniel tried to shove him away and since Sherlock apparently had been satisfied with what he’d seen he stepped back. “You’re such a freak, you know that?”

“Go to the bedroom,” Sherlock ordered. “And stay there!”

“Are you grounding me?”

“As a matter of fact, I am!”

“Well, you can’t do that. You’re not mum!”

It became quite for a moment. Sherlock’s expression became sterner, and Daniel looked victorious. John realised that the boy knew exactly where that comment had hit.

“The good thing about parenthood,” Sherlock said, in a very calm and controlled voice, “is that it’s actually a team sport. When I tell your mum you’re smoking she’s not going to be let you out of the house until you’re starting university.”

“At least then I won’t have to come here!”

“Oh, we’re going to make this a weekly thing, starting now!”

“I hate you!” Daniel yelled, before storming off.

“I’m not so fond of you either right now!” Sherlock called back.

The only answer he got was the bedroom door slamming shut.

Sherlock rubbed his face, sighing deeply and then sitting down heavily on the sofa. For a couple of seconds he just sat there, head tilted back at the wall, eyes closed, before sighing again and looking at John.

“Sorry about that,” he said, making a face.

John waved off the excuse.

“Do you have a spare change of sheets in your room?” Sherlock asked. “I suspect I’ll be sleeping on the sofa tonight.”

“Really?”

“Yes. At least if you want there to be a flat here tomorrow,” Sherlock said, humourlessly.

John smiled faintly, giving Sherlock a concerned look and the permission to go through his closet for a set of sheets. 

The grounding seemed to be effective immediately, whatever Joyce had said when Sherlock called her the next morning, and Daniel seemed to have accepted his faith. At least until lunch, when the volume of the music coming from Sherlock’s bedroom reached a critical level, making John’s tea vibrate.

“Honestly, how can he listen to that excuse for music?” Sherlock muttered and got up from his computer where he’d been corresponding with Lestrade. 

“We can’t all be a fan of the London Symphony Orchestra,” John said, trying to not spill his tea.

“There are enough people here calling me a cultural snob this weekend, thank you,” Sherlock said before banging on his bedroom door. “Turn that bloody music down, and come out and eat lunch instead!”

The result was even louder music and Sherlock, sighing, opened the door to deal with the problem hands on. John could hear them arguing, but he couldn’t hear the words and he wondered what lunch Sherlock wanted Daniel to eat. John was pretty sure nothing had been cooked in the kitchen since they moved in.

“…and there are cold noodles in the one with a green lid.” Sherlock finished a sentence as father and son finally came out again. It took some time before John understood what they were talking about, but when he heard Daniel putting something on a plate and starting the microwave he realised that Sherlock had prepared food for reheating. Either that, or Daniel was going to eat ears and eyeballs and John didn’t want to believe that.

“What?” Sherlock asked when he came out to the sitting room and saw John’s surprised face. “The boy has to eat.”

“You’re not going to join him?” 

“Apparently I ruin his appetite,” Sherlock frowned slightly and looked towards the kitchen while adding in a louder voice: “But seeing idiots throw themselves off rocks, having their bones pop out of their skin is all fine as dining entertainment.”

“You’re such a baby, dad,” Daniel called back. “Just because you can’t stomach to see some blood.”

John looked between the kitchen and Sherlock, feeling confused and amused. Sherlock would be the last person in the world John would call scared of blood.

“I just don’t think it’s behaviour to encourage,” Sherlock corrected him.

“Everybody does it, dad!”

John almost expected the “If everybody jumped off a bridge”-line from Sherlock, but the consulting detective’s phone rang.

“Who was it?” John asked when Sherlock hung up without even answering.

“Lestrade.”

“Who?” Daniel asked, leaning against the wall with his plat in his hand.

“Don’t eat standing up,” Sherlock told him. “And Lestrade is a friend from work.”

John frowned. That was a new description of the DI John had never heard before.

“Simon’s dad works for Google, you know,” Daniel said as he sat down on the sofa with his plate.

“So you’ve told me,” Sherlock muttered as he sent a text.

“And Collin’s is a computer engineer.”

“How wonderful for him.” Sherlock tossed his phone to John when it buzzed. “What do you think?”

“About Collin’s dad?”

“No, about Lestrade’s answer, of course,” Sherlock said. 

John read the text, tossing the phone back to Sherlock. “We didn’t forget to bring him those photos.”

“Thought so,” Sherlock muttered, typing up a quick answer.

“Why can’t you have a cool job?” Daniel asked. 

“I’m sorry to break it to you, but there’s more to life than the marvellous world of computers,” Sherlock said with an annoyed subtext to his calm.

“You suck,” Daniel told his father with a sigh and left the almost empty plate on the coffee table and went back to the bedroom, turning on the music as soon as the door closed.

“Doesn’t he know what you do for a living?” John said in surprise. 

“He knows,” Sherlock sighed. “He knows I’m a consultant to the police, but in his mind that translates to ‘juggling papers and making power points’. If it’s not something that survived the dot-com bubble he wants nothing of it.”

“Has he tried googling you?”

“Have you googled your dull father?” Sherlock asked, smiling when John shook his head. “Thought so. There are still some cold noodles if you want lunch. I can heat it up for you, if you like?”

“Yes, please,” John said, amazed by the offer. Sherlock nodded, walking to the kitchen, bringing with him Daniel’s dirty plate. John chuckled, shaking his head, this was a strange parallel universe he had been living in for the last days. 

On Sunday morning John left early to have brunch with Harry. Not because he really wanted to, but because he had promised and because he thought Sherlock and Daniel needed some time alone in the flat. Sherlock had slept in his bed between Saturday and Sunday – and the flat still stood – and John had to take that as a good thing.

When John came home around 2 – Harry had been delightful as ever – he was greeted by the already so familiar sound of Sherlock’s Stradivarius. This time there was a second sound though, someone answered Sherlock’s distinguished playing with a more tentative tune from a second string instrument.

John carefully walked up the stairs to not scare away this musical phenomenon. He didn’t recognise the melody, but then he never did. John had a suspicion about what he would find in the sitting room, and sure enough in the middle on the sitting room Sherlock and Daniel stood next to each other, playing violin.

The interaction between father and son was the complete opposite from what John had seen earlier. Daniel was reading the music sheet very carefully while Sherlock almost exclusively watched his son’s playing and John was pretty sure no one hated the other in this moment. It was endearing to see, and it reminded John about playing football in the backyard with his dad. This must be the Holmes-version of that.

“Hello, John,” Sherlock said without turning around when the piece was over. Daniel turned and looked at him, blushing. 

“That was amazing,” John said, making Daniel’s blush more intense and Sherlock turn around with a big smile. “Have you played for long, Daniel?”

“Uncle Mycroft bought me my first violin when I was five,” Daniel said and John realised that “uncle Mycroft” sounded just as strange as “dad” sounded when it addressed Sherlock.

“Your uncle has a really good eye when it comes to violins,” Sherlock said to Daniel, putting away the Stradivarius. “He couldn’t play to save his life, but he knows how to buy quality. Have you packed everything?”

“Yes,” Daniel said, the tone of voice telling John that Sherlock had been nagging him about it.

“And you haven’t left anything too incriminating on any hard drive or in the browser history?” 

“ _Dad!_ ” Daniel screamed, his face turning hot red.

“I wasn’t the one leaving – what was it? – Japanese cartoon porn on your mother’s laptop,” Sherlock said. “Though I was blamed for it for some reason.”

Daniel squirmed. “Dad! _Shut up!_ ”

John tried his hardest not to giggle, Sherlock was pure evil.

“Just be glad I’m not talking about the Christmas play in second year,” Sherlock said. “John doesn’t care about your porn consumption as long as he doesn’t have to trip over it when he’s trying to write something in his horrible blog. Isn’t that right, John?”

“Shut up!” Daniel said again, almost pleading this time. “I haven’t even touched his computer, you know that!”

“Don’t worry,” John said, smiling. “It doesn’t bother me, but thanks for not downloading porn on my computer.”

“I hate you,” Daniel muttered defeated, glaring at his dad. The words weren’t even close to as sincere as it had been on Friday, it actually sounded like a grumpy default answer.

“I know,” Sherlock said in a caring voice, grinning. “Now go and get your bag, you know how upset your mum gets when you’re not home in time for dinner.”

“I’m never coming back here,” Daniel mumbled as he went to get the backpack. Sherlock shook his head, smiling, as he put away Daniel’s violin that the boy had left on the table. 

Soon afterwards John and Sherlock followed Daniel downstairs to wave him off. Father and son shared just as an uncomfortable hug as they had started the weekend with, and John was surprised when Daniel shook his hand in good bye.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Daniel earlier,” Sherlock said to John as they watched Daniel walk towards Baker Street station. “I know I said flatmates should know the worst things about each other before moving in together.”

“The worst things?” John grinned. “Sherlock, I’m pretty sure that boy is the best thing about you.”

“Yeah….” Sherlock’s face lit up in the most wonderful smile just as Daniel disappeared behind the corner. “He really is, isn’t he?”

**Author's Note:**

> hey_khaleesi has [translated this into Italian](http://www.efpfanfic.net/viewstory.php?sid=3084790&i=1).


End file.
